Nintendo Fun Club News Project

I remember an old dresser drawer where my uncle kept all of his Nintendo magazines. He had all of the early Nintendo Power issues. I was pretty young at the time so I couldn't read very well. I would pull them out to look at all of the pictures for hours. I remember that there were three or four magazines that were different. They were smaller and less ornate than the others. Later I found out that these were issues of the Nintendo Fun Club News that would eventually turn into the legendary Nintendo Power magazine. There was one issue in particular that had an awesome cover photo of Link on it. I'll never forget, my uncle saw how enamored I was by it and told me I could have it. I've held onto that issue for over 20 years now.

It's in pretty rough shape now. Having seen the value of those magazines rise over the years, I wish that I had taken better care of them. Like many collectors out there, I would love to collect every issue but the cost would just be too high. Using Ebay auctions as a reference point, obtaining all seven issues of the short lived newsletter would cost several hundred dollars (the early issues being the hardest to find).

Nonetheless, there's this really cool website, blurb.com, that lets you create custom books. They have a ton of options and the quality is top notch. I like to use them to make photo books for gifts on occasion. I had the idea to try and make a book that contained every issue of the Nintendo Fun Club News in one place. So I went to the internet and with little surprise found scans of every issue. It turned out pretty great, so I wanted to share it with you guys here:

I made a cover using the artwork from the first issue. I like the simple color scheme.

A shot of the back cover and spine. The book includes a "Table of Contents" and a "Preface" written by myself that gives a brief history of the publication. As well as some registration documents that I found scans of. Then it gets into the magazine issues.

There are in total 170 pages in the book. The quality of the print is excellent. I opted for the "trade" style book that is printed on a non-glossy paper that's easy on the eyes and saves a bit in price.

This shot shows the book up next to my original copy of the 6th issue. You can see that I had to scale the size down slightly to fit it into the book.

I was extremely pleased with how it turned out, and here's the really cool part: You can buy a copy too! Email me at funclubnews@hotmail.com and I will send you an invite to buy a copy for yourself. The prices are: Softcover for $25.99, Hardcover with dust jacket for $39.99, or Hardcover with an image wrap (pictured above) for $40.99. These are Blurb's price points, not mine. I cannot stress this enough: I DO NOT MAKE ANY PROFIT ON SUBSEQUENT PRINTS. Blurb does allow users to mark up your books for profit, but I have them set to sell at cost. My hope is that some retro gaming enthusiasts like myself will find joy in having access to these unique magazine issues in printed form for a reasonable cost.

Let me know what you guys think in the comments, and email me if you want an invite to purchase one for your collection. Thanks for reading!